Related papers: A novel facility for reduced-gravity testing: a se…
In order to improve our understanding of landing on small bodies and of asteroid evolution, we use our novel drop tower facility to perform low-velocity (2-40 cm s^-1), shallow impact experiments of a 10 cm diameter aluminum sphere into…
We introduce an instrument for a wide spectrum of experiments on gravities other than our planet's. It is based on a large Atwood machine where one of the loads is a bucket equipped with a single board computer and different sensors. The…
In developing mobile robots for exploration on the planetary surface, it is crucial to evaluate the robot's performance, demonstrating the harsh environment in which the robot will actually be deployed. Repeatable experiments in a…
We detail a platform for partial g environment and an experiment for simulated impacts on asteroid surfaces based on it. The partial g environment is created by a two stage approach: First, create microgravity using the ZARM drop tower.…
Material deformation and failure under impact loading is a subject of active investigation in space science and often requires very specialized equipment for testing. In this work, we present the design, operational analysis and application…
In order to address the need for an affordable reduced gravity test platform, this work focuses on the analysis and implementation of atmospheric acceleration tracking with an autonomous aerial vehicle. As proof of concept, the vehicle is…
This study is carried out in the framework of sample-return missions to asteroids that use a low-speed projectile as the primary component of its sampling mechanism (e.g., JAXA's Hayabusa and Hayabusa2 missions). We perform numerical…
We discuss the design, operation, and performance of a vacuum setup constructed for use in zero (or reduced) gravity conditions to initiate collisions of fragile millimeter-sized particles at low velocity and temperature. Such particles are…
Small solar system bodies are becoming increasingly important as missions like NASA's OSIRIS-REx show. However, the study of the characteristics and behavior of these objects on Earth is a challenge as the simulation of their environmental…
Experiments on the low-speed impact of solid objects into granular media have been used both to mimic geophysical events and to probe the unusual nature of the granular state of matter. Observations have been interpreted in terms of…
This study describes the development and validation of a novel microgravity experimental platform that is mainly applied to small robots such as modular self-reconfigurable robots. This platform mainly consists of an air supply system, a…
This paper presents the design and development of a Shear and Compression Cell (SCC) for measuring the mechanical properties of granular materials in low-gravity environments. This research is motivated by the increasing interest in…
To gain a better understanding of the surfaces of planets and small bodies in the solar system, the flow behavior of granular material for various gravity levels is of utmost interest. We performed a set of reduced-gravity measurements to…
The dusty regolith covering the surfaces of asteroids and planetary satellites differs in size, shape, and composition from terrestrial soil particles and is subject to very different environmental conditions. Experimental studies of the…
In order to investigate the speed of gravitational signals travelling in air or through a different medium two experiments were designed. One of the experiments contains 2 masses rotating at very high speed and in the other experiment a…
Granular material that is bound by the low gravity of a small asteroid is mobilized by slow velocity impacts. These splashes generated by impacts might play an important role in sculpting the asteroid's surface. In laboratory experiments we…
We develop an original apparatus of the granular impact experiment by which the incident angle of the solid projectile and inclination angle of the target granular layer can be systematically varied. Whereas most of the natural cratering…
In situ observations of small asteroids show that surfaces covered by boulders and coarse terrain are frequent on such bodies. Regolith grain sizes have distributions on approximately mm and cm scales, and the behavior of such large grains…
Collisions between centimeter- to decimeter-sized dusty bodies are important to understand the mechanisms leading to the formation of planetesimals. We thus performed laboratory experiments to study the collisional behavior of dust…
This paper describes the process and challenges behind the design and development of a micro-gravity enabling aerial robot. The vehicle, designed to provide at minimum 4 seconds of micro-gravity at an accuracy of .001 g's, is designed with…